


Asylum

by Jenwryn



Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Alternate Universe, F/M, M/M, Refugees
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-09-11
Updated: 2011-09-11
Packaged: 2017-10-23 15:27:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 390
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/251950
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jenwryn/pseuds/Jenwryn
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><em>Life passes here<br/>Like a plane that skims the shouldered clouds.<br/>New refugees, blocked roads,<br/>The sessions of sweet thought that you proposed,<br/>Exit from this mess the heart controls.</em></p><p>—Peter Nicholson, 'Decades'.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Asylum

**Author's Note:**

  * For [erika](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=erika).



> AU, in which our people are refugee-settlers in the Pegasus Galaxy.

It's been fifteen months since they last heard from Earth; fourteen more, since they'd lost the protection of those origins. This new world hangs still loose around them, almost settled, almost steady. The sea gunmetal grey, and a summer storm pushing in at the horizon. Chimes made of steel and shells clink with beads and bullets, bolts from the second-last 'jumper, and weapons that no longer work. John's new gun, Genii-made, rests half-forgotten in a doorway; Rodney's science, run on sun and stubbornness, waits behind it.

It's humid, air as thick as honey. Too hot to be close like this, but they gravitate regardless; no-one to question, no-one to mind. Shine of sweat on Teyla's brow as she hangs washing beneath the stoop of a house built with scraps, and the strength of their own backs; Lorne passes her pegs to press between her lips in queue. Lorne's shoulders are bare and glistening, blue paint, and purple, not quite washed from his knuckles. Their conversation rests, soft, beneath the heavy air between them.

John's hand on Rodney's thigh, where they sit, on the steps. Rodney sleeping. John's arm around him.

Torren in the dust at their feet; small knees, small feet, small hands shaping patty-cakes with spits of rain-to-come. Silence, without the Wraith above them. Slap slap slap of wet sheets in the oncoming storm. Easy cant of Teyla's hip to Lorne's touch. Music, from further down the narrow street. Laughter, shouting, being alive. Fellow seekers of asylum, a city destroyed beneath a distant ocean, and pieces better left unmended. Life, here, clinging to dirt and soil at the edge of a far sweeter sea.

Wind shakes the chimes. John raises his chin to the weather, drinks in the sight of the rain, and shifts Rodney closer. Lets the sweat slick between them. Sweat, and salt, and sleepiness. Twenty-nine months, and only the basics remain. Teyla's joy, as she steps to the street, last of the sheets hung beneath shelter, and lifts her son to the opening sky. Lorne's easy lean against the stoop, eyes for her alone, the knife at his belt sharp but not needed; not as used as the paint upon his fingers. Rodney's huff of complaint against John's chest. Rodney's familiar weight against him.

This world sinks into them, and they rise up to meet it.


End file.
